BackgroundBangladesh is currently faced with an emerging scenario of increased number of female physicians in the health workforce which has health system implications. For a health system to attract and retain female physicians, information is needed regarding their motivation to choose medical profession, real-life challenges encountered in home and workplaces, propensity to choose a few particular specialties, and factors leading to drop-out from the system. This exploratory mixed-methods study attempted to fill-in this knowledge gap and help the policy makers in designing a gender-sensitive health system.MethodsThree-hundred and fifteen final year female medical students from four purposively selected medical colleges of Dhaka city (two each from public and private colleges) were included in a quantitative survey using self-administered questionnaire. Besides, 31 in-depth interviews with female students, their parents, and in-service trainee physicians, and two focus group discussions with female students were conducted. Gender disaggregated data of physicians and admitted students were also collected. Data were analysed using Stata version 13 and thematic analysis method, as appropriate.ResultsDuring 2006–2015, the female physicians outnumbered their male peers (52% vs. 48%), which is also supported by student admission data during 2011–2016 from the sampled medical colleges, (67% in private compared to 52% in public). Majority of the female medical graduates specialized in Obstetrics and Gynaecology (96%). Social status (66%), respect for medical profession (91%), image of a ‘noble profession’ (91%), and prospects of helping common people (94%) were common motivating factors for them. Gender disparity in work, career and work environment especially in rural areas, and problems of work-home balance, were a few of the challenges mentioned which forced some of them to drop-out. Also, this scenario conditioned them to crowd into a few selected specialties, thereby constraining health system from delivering needed services.ConclusionsIncreasing number of female physicians in health workforce, outnumbering their male peers, is a fact of life for health system of Bangladesh. It’s high time that policy makers pay attention to this and take appropriate remedial measures so that women can pursue their career in an enabling environment and serve the needs and priorities of the health system.

Water chlorination is widely used in emergency responses to reduce diarrheal diseases, although communities with no prior exposure to chlorinated drinking water can have low acceptability. To better inform water treatment interventions, the study explored acceptability, barriers, and motivating-factors of a piped water chlorination program, and household level chlorine-tablet distribution, in place for four months in Rohingya refugee camps, Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. We collected data from June to August 2018 from four purposively selected refugee camps using structured observation, key-informant-interviews, transect-walks, group discussions, focus-group discussions, and in-depth-interviews with males, females, adolescent girls, and community leaders. Smell and taste of chlorinated water were commonly reported barriers among the population that had previously consumed groundwater. Poor quality source-water and suboptimal resultant treated-water, and long-queues for water collection were common complaints. Chlorine-tablet users reported inadequate and interrupted tablet supply, and inconsistent information delivered by different organisations caused confusion. Respondents reported fear of adverse-effects of "chemicals/medicine" used to treat water, especially fear of religious conversion. Water treatment options were reported as easy-to-use, and perceived health-benefits were motivating-factors. In vulnerable refugee communities, community and religious-leaders can formulate and deliver messages to address water taste and smell, instil trust, allay fears, and address rumours/misinformation to maximise early uptake.

A new spectrofluorimetric reagent 2-(α-pyridyl)-thioquinaldinamide (PTQA) has been synthesized and characterized through novel reaction techniques. A very simple, ultra-sensitive and highly selective non-extractive new spectrofluorimetric method for the determination of vanadium at Pico-trace levels using 2-(α-pyridyl)-thioquinaldinamide (PTQA) has been developed. PTQA has been proposed as a new analytical reagent for the direct non-extractive spectrofluorimetric determination of vanadium (V). This novel fluorimetric reagent, PTQA becomes oxidized in a slightly acidic (0.0035-0.0085 M H 2 SO 4) solution within vanadium (V) in 20% ethanol to produce highly fluorescent oxidized product (λ ex = 319 nm; λ em = 371 nm). Constant and maximum fluorescence intensities were observed over a wide range of acidity (0.0035-0.0085 M H 2 SO 4) for the period between 5 min and 24 h. Linear calibration graphs were obtained for 0.001-600-μg•L −1 of V, having a detection limit of 0.3-ng•L −1 ; the quantification limit of the reaction system was found to be 3-ng•L −1 and the RSD was 0%-2%. A large excess of over 60 cations, anions and complexing agents (like, chloride, phosphate, azide, tartrate, oxalate, SCN − etc.) do not interfere in the determination. The developed method was successfully used in the determination of vanadium in several Certified Reference Materials (alloys, steels, serum, bovine liver, drinking water, soil and sediments) as well as in some environmental waters (potable and pol-How to cite this paper: Ahmed, M.J., Afrin, A. and Akhtar, Y. (2019) A Highly Sensitive and Selective Spectrofluorimetric Method for the Determination of Vanadium at Pico-Trace Levels in Some Real, Environmental, Biological, Soil and Food Samples Using 2-(α-Pyridyl)-Thioquinaldinamide.

A number of furanose (2,4) and pyranose (5,7,9,11,13) acetates were prepared by direct acetylation method. For comparative antimicrobial studies sucrose octaacetate (14) was also prepared. All the compounds (1-14) were screened for in vitro antibacterial activity against ten human pathogenic bacteria viz. Bacillus subtilis, Bacillus cereus, Bacillus megaterium, Staphylococcus aureus, Escherichia coli, INABA ET (Vibrio), Pseudomonas species, Salmonella paratyphi, Salmonella typhi and Shigella dysenteriae. These compounds were also screened for in vitro antifungal activity against four pathogenic fungi viz. Aspergillus niger, Alternaria alternata, Curvularia lunata and Fusarium equiseti. The study revealed that the pyranose acetate derivatives (5,7,9,11,13) are more prone towards antimicrobial functionality than those of the furanose acetates (2,4) and sucrose octaacetate (14).

The development of new fluorescent turn-on probes gained much attention for the selective and sensitive detection of biologically important metal ions and their applicability in live cell imaging. Since, it...